With the front of the chassis rails repaired, it's time to tackle the back, and this a much simpler task, as the repair sections we have are an excellent fit. First the spring seat is de-spot welded from the rail, the rail is then repaired before plug-welding the new spring seat sections in place. Note the bare metal under the spring seat - no wonder they rusted so much!!

Next on the agenda is the rear wheel arches which need enlarging to allow clearance for the wide wheels which will fill out the 400 arches. First job is to strip back the quarter panels to bare metal. On the nearside, the arch has been previously repaired, which evidently distorted the panel... There was a lot of filler in it!

Once both arches were cut out they were then welded up allowing clearance for the wider wheels which will fill out the 400 arch kit.

With that complete it's time to tackle the rather ropey rear-of-sill area... First job is to cut all the rotten metal out properly.

Then refabricate the centre sill reinforcment sections, and edge of floorpan....

.....fabricate and fit inner sill, and cover the whole area in zinc weld-thru primer.

We then fabricated and fitted a new out sill repair section, along with a section to close up the back end of the sill and repair an area of inner arch.

Next jobs to tackle are the front-end and the roof. We'll start with the front.... The front panel was completely removed in order to allow repairs to the inner wings to be completed to a good standard. repair sections are still available for the wing mounting rails, and these include a good section of inner wing, so the front section of these repair panels was let in as a starting point.

While working in this area all the unnecessary holes were welded up and ground smooth - we are going for a minimal engine bay on this one.

Moving on to the roof, there is not a lot wrong with the old one, however Curt wants to lose the sunroof, so he has sourced a non-sunroof roof, cut from another car. First job is the tedious task of grinding the seams and drilling the spot welds on both the car and donor roof. This is of course done from opposite sides on each piece, so the frame seams are totally intact on the car and the skin seams untouched on the roof. All the surface corrosion was then cleaned off the frame and skin before coating all in zinc weld-thru primer.

At this point the new skin was clamped into place and a slitting disc run through both skins on the pillar section giving a perfect join line between old and new. The skin was clamped into it's final position, spot-welded along all the original seams, and MIG'd along the pillar joints.

With the roof complete, it's back to the front-end. The valance was very thin around the wing-mounting tabs, so these were cut off completely, and new ones made by taking templates from a pair of genuine GM wings, to ensure the wing-to-valnce join is perfect (even though it will be hidden behind the 400 bumper!)

Moving on to the upper part of the front panel, the headlamp surround was very poor, with previous repairs and rot evident. Repair panels for this area are available, so they were used - a very good fit too. Once this was completed the whole front end was clamped back into place, checked to various dimensions we took before removing it, and checked against the wings, before being welded in place.

Repairs were then fabricated for the front edge of the inner wings. This completed the front-end work. Going back to the rear, the spare wheel well was replaced completely, and a few repairs let in around the rear window aperture. The window aperture and 'c' pillar joints were then lead filled and filed smooth.

Rust-removal complete!! Final welding job is to fit boxes to house the upper-links for the new axle. CAD was used to check the geometry with various link lengths. There seems to be a lot of variations on the rear suspension of 400's. Many have quite short upper links (as per the Commodore B - around 265mm ) but most of the rally cars have longer links, which is preferable. Our mock-up showed a singificant tilt on the diff nose with the short link length, so we upped it to 425mm - bearing in mind we are keeping a back seat (albeit hollowed out a bit!) this was the longest we could go whilst keeping a sensible link seperation (vertical distance between link mounting points).

Next the front wings were cleaned back to bare metal along with any remaining bits of paint on the shell. The quarter panels have distorted slightly during welding of the arch 'tubs' so these areas are straightened out before the shell moves onto the 'prep & paint' stage, ensuring minimal filler is required in the final finish.

The shell receives a skim of filler where neccessary to smooth out any remaining imperfections....

.... Before being moved into the paintbooth and mounted on the spit once again, in readiness for an all-over coating in Max Meyer EcoPhos Anti-Corrossion Etch Primer, followed by an extensive session of seam-sealing with Polyeurathane Sealant.

Next step is to 'dummy fit' the 16V C20XE engine and Omega V6 Geabox, to double-check the clearances, and also allow us to make up the custom stainless exhaust manifold.

The engine and 'box fit perfectly, so we move onto the long-awaited bodykit fitment. First task here is to make sure the arches are a perfect fit to the car, as we want to retain the mounting lips for that hardcore 80's rally car look! This is done by wrapping the wings in cling film, then applying fibreglass filler to the back of the arch mounting flanges and and then fitting them up to the car so the filler takes on the precise shape of the panel. Once cured, the excess is cut/sanded away to leave an arch with a perfect fit to the car ready to be bonded in place.

We are going to split the front bumper and attach the side sections to the wings so we can blend the arch into the bumper without a join. To start with a laser-level is used to mark out vertical lines on the bumper at the point we wish to split it, and stainless steel brackets are made up to support the side sections. Once these are in place the bumper is cut along the lines.

The bumper side sections are then given the same treatment as the arches to create a perfect fit to the wings, before being bonded in place. The whole wing/arch/bumper section is then reinforced from the back with fibreglass, and the gap between arch and bumper filled.

The entire kit is then given a skim of Stopper and sanded back to smooth out the ripples and imperfections that tend to be present on fibreglass kits. Once the shape is 99% there, the whole shell is given a good coat of 2k Build primer.

Here we can see the shell masked ready for application of stonechip compound to the underside, and then following stonechip and paint.

With the shell nearing readiness for paint, the panels need preparing. Starting with the doors, which were fairly well rotten along the bottom. Ascona doors are very hard to come by, however Manta doors are more common and very similar - only the lack of window frame and some slight differences where the frame fits set the two apart, so the decision was made to make good Ascona doors from Manta items.

Curt sourced a mint pair of Manta doors (Cheers to Andy Turner) and we set about removing the frames from the old doors and re-attaching them to the new. This involves drilling the spot welds and grinding back the brazed sections that hold the frames in place, slightly modifying the top of the Manta doors, then offering the whole lot up to the car to get the frame alignment correct before welding them in place.

Once the frames were on the doors were stripped back to the metal. One is as good as perfect. The other has had a bit of a knock at some stage and needed smoothing out. At this point we also stripped the bootlid back to bare metal.

Aside from the frame, the other major difference between Manta and Ascona is the window winder mechanism, which is cable operated on the 'Scona, but cranked on the Manta. The Manta unit is superior in our view, and given that one of the channels that retain the glass on the Ascona was rotten anyway we decided to swap a good pair of Manta retainer channels onto the Ascona glass, and we will use the Manta winder mechanisms.

Ascona channel on the left and new Manta item on the right.

With panels rapidly reaching readiness for paint, and the underside painted it's time to drop the 'shell off the spit, and prepare the front bumper. This involved widening the centre section to close up the join 'gaps' and a good deal of cutting and shaping to improve the somewhat 'wavey' appearance of the bottom edge. The headlamps and grille have been temporarily fitted to check alignment.

As you may have noticed in the above photos, the inside has also now been stonechipped and painted.

Engine bay painted......

The next job is to fit the famous ducktail spoiler. This was trimmed to give a small flange on the rear edge, to match the arches, and a flange was formed underneath at each side to bridge to gap to the bootlid. The exact fit was achieved in much the same way as the arches.

Next to receive the '400' treatment is the bonnet. Curt wants to retain the steel bonnet, but give it the classic 400 triangle cutouts.

With the third and final coat of primer on, a guide coat is applied ready for the final flatting down. Also at this stage we've started work on some of the trim parts - The chrome window trims have been scotch'd-up, etch primered and painted black.

Next, the inside of the panels are primed and painted, and the outside given a final coat of primer and guide-coat.

The whole shell and all the panels are then given a final block-sand and are then wet-flatted with 800 grit paper to give a glass-smooth finish ready for the colour coats.

The car is then masked and meticulously cleaned before the final painting process begins. The Polar White basecoat is applied followed by 3 coats of clear lacquer which is then baked at 60 degrees C for an hour.

Once the clear coat has hardened, the whole job is then wet-flatted with 2000 grit before being buffed, first with 3M Fast-Cut compound and then Farecla 'Glaze'. All the painted panels are then fitted and the car rolled outside for a check-over.

Of course at this stage it's hard to resist bolting a few bits on to see the effect! Rear lights are first! A slightly more sensible job is fitting sound-deadening pads inside the roof and quarter panels.

Next move is to prepare the rear axle. We are using a Salisbury 4HA unit, with a custom made full 5-link setup designed along similar lines to the original 400 rally cars. The first job is to strip the axle, and remove the old brackets, and also strip down the LSD donor (Jaguar diff with Dana LSD).

The casing is then checked for straightness with a laser.

Thankfully it's dead straight, so it's on with the new brackets.

Moving on to slightly less heavy duty work, the MK1 Escort Bias pedal box is fitted and the steering column converted to accept the Corsa electric power assistance setup. The pedal box was chosen as it is bulkhead mounted, but keeps the cylinders inside the car, thus allowing a super-clean engine bay and no clearance issues with the throttle bodies.

Next a bespoke heater box arrangment is being designed to give a clean underbonnet look, and extra clearance to the back of the engine. A slim heater matrix with an integral valve is mounted to the bulkhead along with a Yamaha R6 engine cooling fan (5.5" and very powerful!). A bespoke box is then made up (thanks Clive!) and engraved with the '400' logo before being painted and fitted. A stainless plate is also made and fitted over the bulkhead where the servo would originally have sat.

Had a batch of parts re-plated with a yellow Zinc Passivate finish.... door strikers, boot striker, door check straps, headlamp lens clips, and bonnet latch/spring. Headlamps assembled and fitted with clear indicator lenses and the aformentioned clips.

Next, aluminum arch liners are made up for the rear arches and fixed in place with stainless bolts and 'rivnut' threaded inserts. Similar panels are made to neatly finish the sides of the boot area.

The front subframe is nearly complete, but the two remaining 'scruffy' parts were the metal rings that retain the upper rubber spring seats. We cut discs from galvanised steel and pressed up some replacements.

The rear axle links are also being fabricated at this point. The lower arms are based on Opel Commodore items, but strengthened and rose-jointed at the front end.

Our attention now turns to the wiring. We have decided to go down the route of building a new loom from scratch for several reasons... Firstly so we can route it in a neater fashion than the original, secondly so we can do the wiring to a higher standard (modern fusebox, relays, heatshrunk wiring etc) and thirdly so we can incorporate the extra electrics rather than 'tacking' them on to the standard loom.

The rewire starts with a list being compiled of every wire that will go into the car. This data is put into a spreadsheet including where each wire goes 'from', 'to', the wire length, gauge and where original plugs are used (ie. steering column switches, wiper motor etc) the pin numbers. This allows us to easily total up the amount of wire needed. A version is printed out in small font and the 'to' and 'from' columns are sliced up and clear shrunk to the ends of the corresponding wire as labeling.

Once all the wires are ready they are grouped in the appropriate order and then loomed using heatshrink tubing. All external joints and transitions from loom to individual wires are sealed with adhesive lined heatshrink to prevent water ingress.

With the wiring loom in, things begin to progress quickly. Engine, gearbox, front subframe and axle all go in. Front hubs are machined ally from TJ Motorsport. Rears are Jaguar MK2. Bilstein dampers all round along with 400lb front springs and progressive rate 180lb at the rear. Below you can also see the brake and clutch fluid reservoirs in place along with the wiper mechanism which has been cleaned and detailed.

Next, the hydraulic clutch plumbing goes in along with the TIG welded stainless heater pipes. The rear brakes are fitted - these are Nissan S14 200SX discs and calipers. The Stainless exhaust manifold is fabricated and the QED direct-to-head throttle bodies fitted, the seats come back from the timmers (trimmed in black leather and a replica of the original 400 cloth which we had made to order) and are fitted along with all the glass and various other bits.

Currently the front hubs are standard manta 4-stud which is allowing us to roll the car around on 4-stud wheels until the 5-stud items arrive. The rear is temporarily on jag wheels which look terrible, hence they are not in the pictures!!

Custom made quick-shift taking shape:

And following all the final reassembly details, test-drive and MOT it's ready just in time for the VBOA National Rally at Billing Aquadrome where the car received best in class award in the OMOC Concourse judging. The car will be featured in Retro Cars mag later in the year. In the meantime, here are a few final snaps.